Pigletwillies Banana Shallot Seed update

[wellie]

The ones I 'kept' seem to be disappearing from under my nose Alice! They have proved very popular with Trousers! and I'm using them 'thick and fast' for dishes being cooked for the freezers, along with tomatoes, garlic and chillies.
I shall be growing as many as seeds I have left next year, one can never have too many for the kitchen I find...

[pigletwillie]

Never fear piglets here,

I have some seed left and will be saving some shallots from this years harvest to plant next spring for seed. I have only just got in from our holidays but will be lifting a few of my shallots tommorow and will post up piccies.

[Alice]

Oh yes , please let's see the pics Piglet, Then we can look at ownn pathetic efforts. I'm still blaming the latitude and the weather. Lashing and 13 degrees today. It's been about the same for the whole of August.

[Peter]

Aaaahhhhggggghhhh

Monday night I went to dig some spuds for tea and decided that I really should harvest the pigletwillies as their leaves had gone.
So I carefully went through my shallot plot.

I found twenty-four individual shallots, twenty b****y four.

Piglet these poor things are fated, I though I was OK with one hundred germinating and planting out about eighty.

I shall have to sift my way through the bed now looking for submarines!

The best was, I though, quite impressive, I await your photos before seeing if it is worth photoing mine.

[pigletwillie]

I have just had my pc repaired Peter and am missing some softwear but piccies of my banana shallot crop are on my homepage update.

[Snadger]

I have just had my pc repaired Peter and am missing some softwear but piccies of my banana shallot crop are on my homepage update.

The Hungarian Ham Onions I am growing look exactly the same...but a bit bigger? Have a look at these babies which are the red version.....even bigger and superb eating!

[Alice]

How did your shallots do ?

Well it's that time of year so how did everybody get on with Piglets banana shallots. Mine struggled and died by inches - I don't think the weather suited them. This is my best one, and most of them were like the smaller one. That £10 won't be mine, so come on , let's see the competition.

[Birdie Wife]

IS the general opinion that these don't enjoy northern climes then? Or is it just this season being so wet that did for them? I was going to ask if there was any seed going for next spring, is it worth me trying any do you think?

[Mrs Dobby]

We've about 35 to harvest yet, they only just now seem to be dying back, so will pull them either tomorrow or at the weekend! Will post some piccies as soon as I have some!

[Alice]

I don't know Birdiewife. They certainly seemed to be temperamental here despite my best efforts. I think the idea was to get a hardy strain going by collecting seed from the survivors. Maybe Piglet will correct me if I've got the idea wrong.
I'll be trying again next year - glutton for punishment.

[Birdie Wife]

I'd be happy to get some going going next year from a Scottish source, has anyone north of the border had any luck? PW, do you think it's worth me trying? Or is the far north just a step too far for them?

[Dobby]

We picked the shallots yesterday I have just hung them upside down and they are starting to drip water out is this bad doesnt look goo to me
hope it does not meen they roton

[Alice]

I know a lot of Grapes were growing them - so anybody got any pics. ?

[pigletwillie]

I have pictures on my home page Alice.

http://pigletsplots.blogspot.com/200...-shallots.html

Now some people didnt get very good germination and some didnt crop many and due to the weather all sorts of mishaps confronted them. However as you can see from my crop, I did very well.

There was a question about the germination rates but I found it ok and recently did a germination test twice, sowing 100 seeds each time. In both instances I had about 85% so I feel that there is no issue there. With regard to growing them, if you can sow them in January, just like traditional onion seed and plant them out in April you will be fine.

I have several shallots set to one side for next years seed production but still have a bit of this years seed spare if required, however, it is only a bit. There may well be some rose de roscoff onion seed spare from this years seed crop to distribute as well so we can have another bash at getting British stains going.

[Alice]

Absolutely brilliant shallots Piglet. I'll try again next year. Anybody else got pics of theirs.